It's Guest Rant week at Garden Rant!

Two fun rants have been posted already. Happy reading!

www.gardenrant.com

Goldenrod are in the aster family.

It's hard to think of goldenrod as individual plants, much less individual flowers.




Look closely, though. . .




The individual flowers look like little daisies.

I learned something new!

Don’t Take Wetlands for Granted

That's Gabe's foot on my article in the Franklin Country Gazette.


Don’t Take Wetlands for Granted


This summer, as we drove by a vast and scenic labyrinth of grasses and gleaming water, I remembered something my grandfather once said to me: “those do nothing but breed mosquitoes. They should all be filled in.” He was talking about the costal marshes of Galveston, Texas.

On this recent trip to Galveston, my family watched from the beach as something orange and formless drifted down the coast. Thankfully it wasn’t oil from BP’s spill - it was just seaweed, filled with tiny shrimp for the shore birds to feast on. But our trip was colored by the possibility that this might be the last time that we see the area alive with birds and crabs and native plants.

In the aftermath of hurricane Katrina we as a country are growing more aware that coastal wetlands offer a layer of hurricane protection to low-lying coastal cities. This is of particular importance to the city of Galveston, which was the victim of the nation’s worst natural disaster when, in 1900, a hurricane killed thousands. Exposed as it is, the Galveston area needs all the protection it can get, and BP’s oil spill is making it clear that its protective wetlands, too, are vulnerable.

Here in Massachusetts, our wetlands are similar buffers against natural disaster. When too much rain fell in too short a time this March, pavement and compacted lawns prevented the water from soaking naturally into the earth. Overloaded storm drains couldn’t contain the water, and small backyard streams burst their banks, filling roads and basements, because the water had nowhere else to go.

My own house stands mere feet above wetland, so I assumed that we would soon be underwater, too. But to my relief, the water level of the wetland varied only slightly. That wetland is the fringe of the Charles River watershed, which is, in essence, a very broad and slow-moving stream. The water entering the wetland seeps lazily from one vernal pool to the next as it trickles down the slope of the land, into the Charles, and down into the ground itself, to recharge the water-table below.

This area is so broad and sponge-like that it was able to absorb the torrent of water. It also slowed the water: it took a full twenty-four hours after the rain stopped for the flood to arrive ten miles downstream in Medfield, where it finally forced a closure of route 109. At that location, the road crosses a swath of Charles River wetlands three-quarters of a mile wide. Usually, that region looks like a field full of shrubs, but for that wet week, it looked like a lake. Had those wetlands been filled in because they did nothing but “breed mosquitoes”, there would have been catastrophic flood damage. Instead, there was just the one leisurely road closure.

Being at the head of the Charles river, Franklin, Bellingham, and Milford business are being targeted by the Environmental Protection Agency for new regulations surrounding the runoff from parking lots and roofs. The owners of large areas of impermeable surfaces may soon be required to route their storm water through engineered wetland. This is because wetland acts as a filter, removing phosphorous and other water pollutants before they contaminate the river. Should they pass, these regulations may be onerous for the business owners, but the environmental impact is potentially huge.

To this day pop culture perpetuates the myth of wetlands as being scary, dark, rotting and stinking homes of monsters, but in reality wetlands brim with flowering plants, stately trees, handsome autumn foliage, fascinating wildlife, and scenic views. Wetlands suffer from such bad reputation that in order to be accepted by the gardening public, they have had to be rebranded “water gardens”.

There are different types of wetlands to be seen at parks throughout Massachusetts. Salt marshes, for example, are visible from the Shining Sea Bikeway at Woods Hole. This is a good location for watching ospreys and red-winged blackbirds.

For the adventurous, a half-log trail snakes out into a white cedar bog at Ponkapoag Trail at the Blue Hills Reservation, just south of Boston. White cedar bogs are quite rare in Massachusetts. Three kinds of carnivorous plants live among the bog’s prehistoric-looking mosses. Be sure to bring shoes that can get wet.

Closer to home you can visit an example of our more common swamps and ponds at the Massachusetts Audubon’s Stony Brook Wildlife Sanctuary in Norfolk. There, a solid deck walkway - safe enough for strollers - leads through wetland and across a pond. Massive highbrush blueberry and swamp azalea bushes make a tunnel around the walkway, and armies of turtles laze among water lilies and exotic-looking pickerel weed.

There may be a few mosquitoes at these landscapes, but for such beautiful scenery, they are worth it.

Northwind

A little while ago I had my second visit to Northwind Perennials in a year, they are just outside Lake Geneva in Wisconsin. Run by three people who all take different roles in the company, it is Roy Diblik who is known as the plantsman - he was a real pioneer in the containerised production of native perennials.

Colleen Garrigan does some wonderfully artistic or even wacky assemblages of old tools, architectural salvage etc. 
  
Roy has developed a sophisticated take on the art of putting together native and non-native perennials - all explained in a neat little book - 'Small Perennial Gardens: The Know Maintenance Approach'.                                                                                                                                                                        The pun is based on the fact that what so many (American) gardeners seem to want is NO maintenance, but Roy is keen to stress that if you KNOW your plants then you can reduce maintenance - and this is key, without smothering the ground with wood chip mulch.               

The plant combinations are very much about creating a complete canopy so grasses shoehorn in between flowering forbs like liatris and echinacea and sprawly (but not actualy spreading) low things like calaminthas can fill in the gaps. The display gardens around the nursery are very accomplished with a good 'field' type effect, and nicely integrated with shrubs and small trees.

Now - the wood chip. A good example of how a 'good thing' becomes a 'bad thing'. Not so long ago mulch was seen as solving  a lot problems - like reducing moisture loss and smothering weeds, but of course like all good things (chocolate cake, beer etc.) can be overdone. Wood chip has become one of Roy's pet hates, and I can see why - a lot of folk around Chicago seem to think that wood chip is an end in itself, any plants standing out looking rather lonesome. The stuff is dumped on every year, so not surprisingly plants underneath can be completly buried, and in the hot humid summers, all sort of diseases get going. What's more, a lot of the wood chip gets shipped up from Georgia, so the transport miles are pretty crazy.

Hummingbird Battle

I promised more photos of hummers, so here they are!




There were two of them on that morning, and they were taking turns chasing each other away from the evening primrose. I could hear their tiny, squeaky chirps. I'm sure in hummingbird language, those cute little sounds were actually bellows of rage. Hummers are territorial little brutes.




I'm tempted to apologize for the quality of the photos, but I've never tried to photograph such quick, unpredictable subjects.

The morning sun was hitting the flowers, but the battle progressed to the fence, which was still in the shade.




It seemed to me like they were expending a silly amount of energy driving each other away from the food.




The following day Chris confirmed that the hummers were using the scarlet runner beans (Phaseolus coccineus) as a food source, too. I'll have to get some photos of that plant. It is definitely one that we'll be growing again. The beans are tasty, the flowers are pretty, and they attract hummingbirds. Win win win!

Finally, rain!

I didn't want to jinx it yesterday, but the drizzle has continued for a day and a half now. Thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster! We sure needed some rain.

The local farms are relieved. I was curious, and happy, to read that the drought wasn't as detrimental to the crops as last summer's wetness was:

"In Millis, while saying the rains were certainly a welcome sight, Laura Tangerini, owner of Tangerini's Spring Street Farm, said dry spells are part of running a farm. She said she prefers this year's dry weather over last year's soaking rains because it has kept diseases and many types of insects in check."

I grew these by accident.

I didn't plant any evening primrose here. I just failed to do any weeding for two years.




Oenothera biennis at its best. These must be seven feet tall. Perhaps with some selective weeding I could turn this into a perpetual primrose bed, with a few shorter plants in front to hide those scrawny legs.




I really didn't know how amazing these flowers are until a morning last week when I woke up at the crack of dawn, and couldn't get back to sleep. I was too cranky to do yard work, so I stumbled outside with my cup of placebo decaf to water my potted plants with liquid sulk.

First I noticed the smell. Evening primrose on a cool morning smell spectacular! I don't normally notice smells. There were all sorts of pollinators rolling around in the primrose blossoms, and now that I have experienced that beautiful smell, I think I can safely say that those bugs are downright drunk with the aroma.

A pair of goldfinches paid a visit, too. I thought they only ate the seeds, so I'm not sure what they were doing on an evening primrose this early in the season. Scouting, perhaps?



And then I saw something zip by.




Hot damn! Hummers!

I grabbed the camera and got cozy on the bench. Sure enough, they went about their business as I snapped away.




Stay tuned for Battle Hummingbird. . .

Jim Archibald

Jim Archibald, who died last week, was one of the 'last of the great plant hunters'. This is what I wrote about him for an obituary to be published in The Daily Telegraph.

    For those of us in the gardening world who enjoy the challenge of growing unusual and rare plants, the annual arrival of a seedlist from Jim and Jenny Archibald was keenly awaited. Unillustrated, and consisting of A4 sheets stapled together, it would inevitably list scores of intriguing plants, mostly offered as seed collected in the wild. Some would be new forms of familiar species, some species of groups we know and are familiar with, but many would be completely unknown. However it was the introduction that many of us would read most keenly. Who would be Jim Archibald’s target this year: a botanist whose opinions on plant naming he disagreed with, the Royal Horticultural Society, Kew Gardens, or someone being holier-than-thou about the ethics of collecting seed in the wild? The introduction was always erudite, well-informed, witty and often very hard-hitting; in the world of gardening, where there is little openly-expressed disagreement they were a true tonic.
    Archibald’s career as a freelance plant hunter and seedsman extraordinaire began, appropriately, with another plant catalogue. That of Jack Drake, a famous grower of perennials and alpines in Aviemore. As a teenager Archibald was a keen gardener, and it was the listing of some plants grown from an expedition to Nepal in 1954 which fired his enthusiasm. His holidays were spent working at Drake’s nursery, and even at university (Edinburgh), where he read English Language and Literature, he continued to grow, and even sell, unusual plants. Early trips to look at plants growing wild and collect seed followed, to Corsica and Morocco.
    Travelling, often in out of the way places, looking for plants was soon established as a lifestyle. He would make light of the process, I remember him telling me once that “seed collecting in the past might have involved intrepid hikes or perilous adventures on donkeys but these days the road system makes it a lot easier, we rarely need to go anywhere more than a few hours from at least a track”. But soon he would talking casually about collecting alpine plants from the “mountains of the Iran/Iraq border region”. Then there is the story, legendary amongst alpine plant enthusiasts, of ‘the van to Van’, when he and Jenny towed a caravan to eastern Turkey, to use as a base for seed collecting.
    The only period Archibald was not spending at least part of the year travelling, it was running a nursery – The Plantsman, near Sherborne in Dorset, from 1967 to 1983. Working in conjunction with Eric Smith, it was the forerunner of the great many small specialist nurseries which make the British gardening scene so vibrant. The Plantsman was famous for its hellebores and hostas, many varieties bred by Smith. Unable to make a success of the nursery as a business, Jim turned to his first love, of travelling.
    Usually accompanied by Jenny, who he had met in the early 1970s, Archibald established an annual cycle of summer and autumn seed collecting, selling the seed in the winter and spring. With a clear focus on alpines and small bulbs, JJA Seeds sold primarily to enthusiastic amateurs, but also to botanic gardens (at least until the restrictions of the Convention on Bio-Diversity made this difficult) and nurseries. Some of his bulb introductions were used by Dutch breeders to produce new varieties for the general public, but it was commercial growers of alpine and rock plants who relied on him for a constant supply of interesting plants; it is reckoned that almost anyone growing such plants today will have some which originated as JJA seed.
    Famed for his memory, Archibald seemed to have an almost photographic memory for the plants he collected, even able to take fellow travellers back to the exact rock where he found a particular plant, many years after he first visited the spot. His favourite hunting grounds for the plants he loved were the mountains of Iran and Turkey; occasional run-ins with military check-points or secret police did little to dent his enthusiasm. In later years he spent more time in the mountains of the western USA, often working alongside the growing number of local botanist-gardeners who were passionate about both seeing their native flora in the wild and growing it.
    Archibald was resolutely not commercial. Many times I tried to persuade him to pay more attention to collecting seed from larger herbaceous plants – apart from anything else they could have been more remunerative, but he stuck to what he loved.
     Many of us also wished that Archibald had taken up journalism. Those seedlist introductions were always worth re-reading – barbs flung (but always politely) at the pomposity of botanists who concealed data (supposedly in the name of conservation), at the effects of political-correctness on horticulture, at the dogmatic application of ill-thought out quasi-legal concepts like the Convention on Bio-diversity or Plant Breeders Rights.
    Archibald’s knowledge and ability to communicate it was recognised by the Alpine Garden Society, who in 2003 gave him their highest award – the Lyttel Trophy, given annually in recognition of a lifetime of achievement in contributions to the growing of alpine plants, their culture and botany. His incredibly wide circle of friends and colleagues in the garden and botanical worlds will remember a man of great intellectual integrity, enormous and infectious enthusiasm, who combined real erudition and learning with an ability to communicate it, and great personal warmth. Eloquent too, one seedlist introduction ended -  “we sell dreams to ourselves and hope to pay for their reality by work and knowledge…what are seeds but dreams in packets?”

"Miracle Blog Party" and Giveaway

Welcome. I am so happy that you stopped by. My garden gate is always open for you to come in and sit and relax - have a cup of tea and attend Design Gives Back's " MIRACLE BOG PARTY " AND FABULOUS GIVEAWAYS on Friday August 27th - Saturday August 28th and Sunday August 29th celebrating Colette's Miracle Makeover and inspirational story and reveal video.



If you are just finding out about the Miracle Makeover project - the makeover project all started when Kelee of Design Gives Back, http://www.katillacshack.com/, decided to take a crew up to Michigan in the middle of last winter to create a healing room in which Colette Gauthier could recover. Colette was living in a tiny and dismal rental home. And, she was almost out of hope as she had been diagnosed with breast cancer and was given a 5-15% chance of survival.

God has given her different odds though!

You can see her journey and the miracle that happened on the reveal video. There are plenty of great design ideas and the heart warming video is truly inspirational. Please go to http://www.katillacshack.com/ to attend the party, view the video and leave a comment to win one of the fabulous prises. You can also read about the miracle that happened in the September issue of Guideposts Magazine - www.guideposts.org.

MIRACLE PARTY GIVEAWAYS

A NEW JANOME SEWING MACHINE

AN ERIN HOUGHTON ORIGINAL ROSE PAINTING

A PENNY CARLSON MOSAIC CROSS

GUIDEPOSTS MAGAZINE SUBSCRIPTIONS

Karen Harvey Cox Original Watercolor Painting

In celebration of Colette's journey and healing , my 100th post and Pink Saturday, I am also having a GIVEAWAY of this original rose painting shown below.

Give Away Painting from The Painted Garden. Details on how to enter to win are shown below.


My journey as a thankful nine year breast cancer survivor has been to share my creative gift from God to paint with others who have cancer. I felt a connection to Colette when I first read about her story on http://www.katillacshack.com/. She loves roses and her favorite colors are Amethyst, for peace, Spring Green for health, and Rose Pink for love and family. After seeing the beautiful fabrics that she and Kelee picked out for her makeover room I was moved to create a painting for Colette and contacted Kelee to ask if there was a need for a piece of art. She said yes that there was room for a small painting to sit on a table in her room.

Finding Inspiration . . . . . for Colette's painting.


Fabric for Colette's room





Here . . . .






There . . . .




Everywhere . . . .




The sweet pea photograph has all of Colette's favorite colors and was the final inspiration for Colette's painting.




Colette's Miracle Makeover painting.

This post is a celebration of Colette's journey and Miracle healing that started with the prayers good wishes and actions of so many in the blog community.

There is power in united prayer. Jesus said "Where two or three are gathered in my name. I am there among them." (Mt,18:20). The power of prayer was strengthened as so many united together in prayer for Colette.

Colette Gauthier
Thank you for your courage and inspiration to all of us.

Give Away For The Painted Garden Rose Painting

Original Rose painting on my blog. To enter please leave a comment for Colette on my blog in order to enter the drawing to win my rose painting. You do not need to have a blog to win- simply leave a comment under Anonymous. Winner will be announced on September 4, 2010.

GIVE AWAYS ON WWW.KATILLACSHACK .COM

SEWING MACHINE, LARGE ORIGINAL ROSE PAINTING, MOSAIC CROSS, GUIDEPOST MAGAZINE SUBSCRIPTIONS: Please leave a comment on http://www.katillacshack.com/ to enter to win the giveaway prizes and earn a $1.00 donation toward a similar makeover project. You will also be entered to win her fabulous giveaways.

HOW TO EARN UP TO $5.00 TO GO TOWARD SIMILAR MAKEOVER PROJECTS

Leave a comment regarding the Miracle Makeover on the following blogs:

Sherry's : www.countrywingsinphoenix.blogspot.com

Charlotte and Ginger's: www.bloggerspirit.blogspot.com

Beverly's www.howsweetthesound.typepad.com - at Pink Saturday

www.facebook.com/guideposts - please thank Guidepost for sponsoring the Miracle Makeover

www.katillacshack.com

Blessings and a big thank you goes to Kelee, Guideposts magazine ,the Design Angel Volunteers and Beverly, Charlotte and Ginger and Sherry and to everyone in Blog Land for their prayers and support of Colette.

Thank you for stopping by. I love hearing from you and sincerely appreciate your vists, comments and those who are following my blog. Have a lovely week. Blessings, Erin

"Butterfly weed"

The short milkweed Asclepias tuberosa has become one of my new favorite native flowers for the flower garden. The groundhog munched it to the ground a couple of times, but once I planted a few other things around it, he seems to have lost the plant's location. They have been blooming and blooming through this nasty drought.

These were grown from some scrawny mail-order tubers which arrived this spring. The plants are about eight inches tall and I don't think they have the running growth habit of common milkweed. The only downside, oddly: the flowers don't seem to attract many insects. But perhaps I just haven't been around when the insects visit.

Finally! Sorta. . .

Well, I've been saying since we moved in that I would take this eyesore down.



Now that it's down, it looks overwhelmingly large. I'm not sure how to dispose of it.

Maybe I should have just used it as a trellis.

Let's Paint Together The Last Hydrangeas

Welcome. I am so happy that you stopped by. My garden gate is always open for you to come in and sit and relax (have a cup of tea if you are not too hot) while I share inspirations for my art with you. I just cut the last of my hydrangeas and thought it would be fun and a good time for us to paint them together.

Bentley, my helpful Studio Assistant, is ready to show you around.

Finding inspiration . . . .

Here . . . . .

There . . . . . .

Everywhere . . . . .

Close up of previously painted hydrangeas.

We are going to paint a hydrangea Welcome sign. It is my best selling Welcome sign and very easy to paint. I have painted a sample leaf and flower for you to follow. If you still have hydrangeas you can actually trace a leaf to get the feel of the shape. First, paint a dark shape, unless painting with watercolors, paint dark to light. Paint a dark shape first. Next add some white to your dark shape and start developing you flower petals with different shades of blue. The lightest colors will be painted on top of your flower. Note, in the painting above, I painted lavender petals in with the blue petals. If you paint lavender or pink hydrangeas - follow the same technique - paint your dark first and then highlight with light.

I paint on an 8x10 canvas. You can use a canvas, wooden board, or piece of slate. All materials can be purchased at Michael's or Joanne Craft or any craft store.


Here is my rough drawing.

Paint the basket in various shades of brown - use your darkest brown to highlight the vertical weaves in the basket. Fill in the horizontal weave with different shades of brown. Add some white to highlight the weave - I also use some oranges and yellows to give variation to the basket weave. Add a little dark on the bottom of your basket - this will anchor it and will keep it from "floating". Next add a little lavender shadow. I attach a ribbon with screw eye hooks and add a ribbon to hang it with. I then add three coats of satin varnish to protect the finish.

Enjoy your painting.

Thank you for stopping by to visit. I love hearing from you and sincerely appreciate your visits, comments and those who are following my blog. Please let me know if you have any comments or would like to see me paint something special. I regret that I had to turn on my comment moderation because a fraudulent company tried to advertise on my blog by leaving me 73 anonynous comments advertising Ed Hardy Clothing.

Have a lovely week. Blessings, Erin

Good morning.

I've been waking up early lately. Mornings are peaceful. Here's the meadow around back.




This is the only one of my transplanted goldenrod that bloomed this year. I'm surprised that anything survived transplant this summer. I haven't been very good about watering out here during the drought.




The poison sumac has started to unfurl its autumnal glory there on the right, just a little.




Some sort of thistle has volunteered here. I don't know if it's native.




This is one of several groundcherries I transplanted into the meadow. Groundcherry tends to melt into a puddle when transplanted, but with a little water the root survives and starts growing again within weeks.




The first sunlight of morning glows on the grass. The small pokeweed grew from a giant root that I ripped out of the ground elsewhere the previous year.

Vinca battle

I neglected to get a "before" photo of this corner. It contained a clump of some verigated, trouble-making grass, which I suspect to be invasive, volunteered Japanese barberry, Asiatic bittersweet, and gobs of periwinkle. I had a large round cone of black plastic left over from the top of a failed compost bin. I stuck that on the grass to kill it, and for a few weeks in the Spring we could lift it up to see a dozen surprised-looking snakes inside.

The plants under the cover cooked nicely. Then, this weekend, as I walked by, I couldn't resist tugging one strand of periwinkle out of the yew. The nasty stuff was entwined all through the shrub. Then I tugged another. And another.




This is what the bed looks like a little farther on: a nice, dense mat of periwinkle. It would be nice if it weren't sending out runners into the grass. Left unchecked, it would do this to my meadow. And to the woods beyond. Periwinkle, Vinca minor, does not play nice with Massachusetts woods. It carpets the forest floor and prevents native plants from growing. I don't know why it didn't rank the Massachusetts Prohibited Plant list.




I kept yanking and yanking. The plants went into a plastic bag, to make sure they are well and truly dead before I compost them. I'm not taking any chances. Here is the bed after I've cleared out some space.




A lot of work remains to be done in this space. But I suppose the dawning question is: what should I plant here?